


Azula Always Lies

by AllHailProHeroThirteen04102016



Series: Self-Indulgent Avatar Fanfics [3]
Category: Avatar: The Last Airbender
Genre: Character Study, Child Abuse, Gen, Insanity, Mental Health Issues, Miiiiild self-insert
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-02
Updated: 2020-09-02
Packaged: 2021-03-07 01:07:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 336
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26248417
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AllHailProHeroThirteen04102016/pseuds/AllHailProHeroThirteen04102016
Summary: Father is a liar. Father hates people who aren't like him.Zuko eventually leaves.He doesn't see the eyes following his back with cautious envy.
Relationships: Azula & Iroh (Avatar), Azula & Zuko (Avatar), Iroh & Zuko (Avatar)
Series: Self-Indulgent Avatar Fanfics [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1860883
Comments: 4
Kudos: 49





	Azula Always Lies

**Author's Note:**

> Beware: I have recently rewatched the first nine episodes of ATLA and barely remember the rest because the last time I watched the series I was seven.

Azula always lies.

"Not unless the truth hurts more," Uncle had said.

He wasn't wrong.

But he's also wrong.

Zuko remembers when he still belonged to the palace, when Azula would stumble out of trainings with bruises carefully placed out of sight. Too many bruises to be necessary.

He had marched up to her and angrily demanded why she was hurt. Instead they end up fighting and later being scolded, left in their rooms nursing their wounded pride.

Except Zuko couldn't forget the brief flash of fear on her face before she does that face he hated.

He had wondered if that was why she stopped taking baths with Mother when training started. (As soon as she learned to walk.)

"It's nothing, Zuzu," she had snarled, like a storm dragon in the paintings but without their strength.

Azula gets better at lying, lying with her words, with her face, used that skill to be able to translate flinches into reflexes for combat faster than he did. After all, Father trains her personally.

Mother disappears to protect him. He feels angry at Azula's nonchalance.

"Mother never protected me or loved me. Why should I care?" She snapped, in a rare show of humanity. Of weakness.

He forgets about it when she would later find delight in her position of power, in his suffering and when she becomes Crown Princess.

When he is banished, he lies to himself.

_Father loves us._

In the end, that palace of lies they built crumble down. The Avatar takes the first step towards peace.

In the mental hospital, Azula laughs cruelly and holds tightly to a false reality, a warped mirror that kept her sane until it shattered and made her bleed.

Nobody other than Zuko knew _why_ Azula always lied.

Her laughter and screams slowly dies, like a flame igniting on wick with no wax, and she breaks down and weeps.

She's still holding onto the glass shards and all it's doing is hurting her.

_Azula always lied to protect herself._


End file.
